280 



♦ KNO^ATLEDGK ♦ 



[July 1, 1886. 



the way of sugtrestion. The cure of the naval officer already 

 considered might be attributed in tins sense to the action 

 of the surgeon's mind on the patient's hoij, for it was the 

 ideas advanced by the surgeon which excited the necessary 

 action in the mind of the patient whereby the progress of 

 disease in his body was checked. But as in that case the 

 immediate remedial agent was (Lf the case was interpreted 

 correctly) the mental action of the sufferer, so all the pheno- 

 mena of hypnotism are due to cerebral processes in the sub- 

 ject, these processes being simply initiated by the sugges- 

 tions, more or less obvious, of the operator. I have said 

 that the magnetic interpretation has been disproved, and 

 equally it can be asserted that the supposed influence of the 

 operator's mind on the subject's body his no real existence. 

 I have not space here to consider the evidence ; but full 

 evidence has been obtained that precisely as all the results 

 of metallic tractorism (a special case of animal magnetism, 

 as was supposed) can be obtained with wooden ones, so all 

 the phenomena attributed to animal magnetism generally 

 can be obtained without any magnetic influences, while the 

 phenomena which had seamed to be excited by the active 

 will of an operator are obtained in equal degree when he 

 purposely diverts his thoughts to other matters. The only 

 circumstance remaining unexplained in the phenomena of 

 hvpnotism is the strange power wliich the subject oft«n 

 possesses, or seems to possess, of reading the thoughts of the 

 operator. But this may probably be I'egai-ded as simply 

 illustrating the abnormal powers which the mind of the 

 hypnotised possesses for the time being ; and indeed it is 

 certain that the power of mind-reading acquired at such 

 times (probably, merely the power of recognising minute 

 changes of expression, attitude, gesture, and so forth) is by 

 no means limited to the operator; in some of the most re- 

 markable and the best-attested instances the liypnotised 

 person has been able to read the thoughts of any person to 

 whom his attention has been dii-ected.* 



Setting aside, however, all explanations based on hypo- 

 theses inconsistent with the known laws of physics, or on 

 impressions supposed to be produced by one person's mind 

 on another person's body — in fact, all such explanations as 

 science is bound to reject — we find in the phenomena of 

 hypnotism the most wonderful illustrations of the power 

 which the mind has over the body. We might consider here 

 a number of cases illustrating the cure of paralysis and aflec- 

 tions more or less obviously depending on the state of the 

 nervous system ; but it will be better to limit our attention 

 at present to the far more striking cases in which a definite 

 change has been produced in the condition of parts of the 

 body which might be supposed altogether beyond the mental 

 influence — that is, so far as their organic structure was con- 

 cerned. 



In relation to one remarkable ca-se of the former kind 

 described Viy Dr. Procter, of York (see the "Zoist" for 

 1851), in which the patient was averee to the trial and ex- 

 pected no result, whereas the cure was as com)5lete in his 

 case as if he had been full of faith in the magnetic passes, it 

 is necessary to make some remarks. The case is not one 

 which need be described here, but the inference that because 

 of the patient's unbelief we must reject the theory that 

 imagination had aught to do with the matter is one to be 



* It would seem, indeed, probable that the special cerebral con- 

 dition produced in the hypnotised may be excited at will by some per- 

 sons ; without the assistance of any operator they become subjects of 

 their own mental control thus specifically exercised. Some remark- 

 able cases of mind-reading (among'st others may be mentioned two 

 described by Dickens — see Forster's Zi/e — as exhibited by a French 

 conjurer at the time of the Ang-lo-French alliance) seem explicable 

 in no other waj% and in this way explicable without any mysterious 

 or supernatural agencies (which are, of course, ex necessitate, ex- 

 cluded from the scientific discussion of such matters). 



carefully considered. Dr. Todd has well pointed out that 

 the essential point in these cases is not the encouragement 

 of the expectation of cure, but the direction of the attention 

 to the part of the body which is affected by disease. The 

 unbelieving patient who at the same time is indifferent to 

 the experiment would doubtless be an uupromi.sing subject 

 for the mental method ; but a patient who took sufficient 

 interest in the passes and other outward signs of mesmerism 

 to be opposed to them, would probably be quite as favour- 

 able a subject for the method as one who took the same 

 degree of interest in them because he believed in their 

 efficac}'. 



The most striking illustrations of the effect of imagination 

 excited, as when hypnotism or Braidism is produced, are 

 those in which partial blindness has been cured, actual 

 opacity of the cornea being removed. Where very weak 

 sight has been quickly cured, we may assume that the weak- 

 ness was in the optic nerve, or otherwise depended on the 

 state of the nerves, but it will presently be seen that in other 

 c;ises the structure of the eye has undergone a definite 

 organic change. 



To the former and less remarkable class of cases belongs 

 the cure of Sirs. Stowe by Braid. She was forty-four years 

 old, and had used spectacles for twenty-two years, not being 

 able without them to distinguish even the capital letters of 

 advertisements in a newspaper, nor the lai'ge heading of the 

 paper. After being hypnotised by Braid for eight minutes 

 she was able '" to i-ead lioth the large and small heading, and 

 day, month, and date of the paper. Her sight continued to 

 improve — she could thread her needle. No. 8, without spec- 

 tacles ; " and Mr. Braid states that this remarkable increase 

 of visual power has been retained. 



The case of Miss K. was equally remarkable. She had not 

 only sufl'ered from ophthalmia, but as a result of the partial 

 blindness thus occasioned had met with several accidents, 

 some of which had further injured her e3'es, insomuch that 

 she was totally blind. She was placed under the care of a 

 physician at Dublin during six weeks, and improved to .some 

 degree, " for the iris had become somewhat sensitive to light, 

 and she was able to discern large objects, but could neither 

 see to read nor write." She returned home, but her eyesight 

 remained without further improvement, and at length her 

 medical attendant recommended that she should be placed 

 under ilr. Braid's care. He found no apparent physical 

 imperfection to account for her impaired vision, nor at this 

 time did she sufler from any pain about the liead or eyes. 

 She could not discern a single letter of the title-page of a 

 book placed close to her, though some of tlie letters were a 

 quarter of an inch long. Having placed the patient in the 

 condition of artificial somnambulisi:i, Mr. Braid "' directed 

 the nervous force to the eyes b)' wafting ovei' them, and 

 gently touching them occasionally, so as to keep up a sus- 

 tained act of attention of the patient's mind to her eyes and 

 the function of vision." (Some objection must be taken in 

 pa.ssing to the statement that the nervous force was directeil 

 to the eyes, because it involves an assumption. The attention 

 was directed to the eyes ; what intervened between this act 

 and the observed change in the patient's condition is a matter 

 to be inferred, not assumed.) In about ten minutes she was 

 aroused from the hypnotic trance. " I now presented before 

 her the title-page of the same book, when she instantly ex- 

 claimed with delight and surprise, ' I see the word '■ com- 

 merce ! " ' pointing to it. I told her she would see more 

 than that presently, and in a little while she exclaimed, ' I 

 see " commercial," ' then ' I see " dictionarj'," ' and shortly 

 after, 'I see "McCidloch ;"' but she could see nothing more. 

 I told her that after a little rest I felt assured she would see 

 still smaller print ; and after a few minutes she was able to 

 read ' London : Longman, Green, and Longmans.' Such 



